1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to sports equipment and is more particularly concerned with a means for securing the position of a soccer shin guard during competitive sports activity.
2. Discussion of Prior Art
Soccer players wear shin guards to protect their lower leg from inadvertent injury during the course of soccer play. It is well known in the art to attach one or more elastic straps directly to the shin guard as a means of securing it in the proper protective position around the player's lower leg. The prior art includes a variety of patents which employ various methods to keep shin guards in place while soccer players are engaged in the sport.
Shin guards are held in position against the leg by a variety of means, including: (1) continuous or separate elastic straps affixed to the shin guard; (2) fixed, non-adjustable split loop material attached to the longitudinal surface of the shin guard which attaches to the inside surface of the soccer sock (Edelson, U.S. Pat. No. 3,465,364); (3) customized soccer socks for holding shin guards in position (Hicks, U.S. Pat. No. 5,581,817 and Jones, U.S. Pat. No. 4,669,126); and (4) strapless shin guards held in place simply by the tension created by the knit soccer sock.
Despite the prior art of attached elastic shin guard straps, custom molded shin guards (Jacobs, U.S. Pat. No. 5,405,312) and customized socks, a soccer shin guard is prone to movement to an uncomfortable, interfering or non-protective position. The use of athletic tape, wrapped around the sock immediately below or above the shin guard, has solved the problem of shin guard movement for many players. However, the use of athletic tape for this application is associated with many problems, including: (1) time consuming attachment and removal; (2) detachment of tape and loss of the locking seal when wet; (3) breakage of tape during play and loss of the locking seal; (4) not-reusable; and (5) adhesive-induced fraying and destruction of the knit soccer sock. Furthermore, discarded athletic tape litters soccer fields and complexes, and can damage lawn equipment used to maintain the fields.